Show irl ai I 1 w sn U C sy syvia jaw A VII S CARIBBEAN conspiracy oi 1 51 bt CONRAD c on ammom THE STORY SO FAR anne heywood beautiful daughter of a wealthy new york newspaper publisher goes on an assignment to puerto rico where pete wilcox a reporter on her fathers paper is stationed as a U S army intelligence officer on the boat she meets a young puerto rican miguel valera and an en gincer named richard taussig of whom she Is suspicious although she does not know that he Is actually a german agent ordered to destroy puerto ricos water supply at the hotel in san juan annes luggage Is searched and she suspects taussig anne and mr taussig have been invited to dinner at the home of the russell porters sue porter and anne went to school together CHAPTER VII its early miss heywood mr taussig said as they came into the lobby and russells car moved out of the drive why dont we have a nightcap night cap together oh thanks a lot anne said but ive really id like to talk to you miss heywood mr taussig said quietly for an instant anne hesitated A cold warning finger touched her heart it was coming now miguel valera had told him I 1 dont believe it she thought quickly no matter what I 1 dont believe it mr taussig was looking at her intently all right she said in the bar he waited for her to sit down and signalled signal led the waiter he might be making a mistake he thought 1 I may as well come to the point at once miss heywood he said pleasantly annes throat tightened it if she only had a face like barbara frenchs franchs Frenc hs she thought where nothing ever showed she leaned forward with a smile so that he see her heart pounding under the filmy folds of her dinner dress all right she said what is it the waiter put their glasses down on the table mr taussig raised his to our better understanding miss heywood anne raised hers she was aware of what barbara had called the veiled scrutiny behind his impregnable lenses it is your interest in me that confuses me slightly miss heywood anne looked at him blankly what do you janean mr taussig oh not interest damour miss heywood I 1 dont mean that I 1 mean interest in my shall we say belongings last night tor for example anne sat perfectly calm and completely controlled while the whole bottom of a kind of lovely dream inside her dropped out in shattered fragments miguel had told him 1 I was just returning the compliment mr taussig she said her voice was calm and detached she thought she saw him start but she be sure I 1 may I 1 ask what you mean by that miss heywood he asked quietly you went through my bags yesterday you mr taussig he was staring at her in open and undisguised astonishment anne misunderstood what if she was wrong what if it been he at all she know she was only guessing actually he recover recovered ed his composure in an instant if she had lied he have known what makes you think I 1 did uch such an incredible thing aty ib your thumb prints mr taus ls sig anne said it shed been wrong he could deny it and she would apologize he thought quickly his hands had been moist from the heat he smiled 1 I think youve jumped to a very hasty conclusion miss heywood you have a bag just like one of mine the porter put yours in my room I 1 opened it but I 1 closed it at once of course and had the porter take it to your room and bring mine to me find theres usually a simple explanation for most things miss heywood then I 1 apologize profoundly mr taussig anne said im glad we talked about it she got up and held out her hand she could see the indecision in the cold blue gleam of his eyes fastened on hers he sure whether she was telling the truth or not and she knew he had lied anne lay in the luminous halt half dark under the oblong tent of cheesecloth around her bed trying to think without feeling trying to separate the things she knew from the things she suspected but did not actually know without coloring them with her own emotions it was the first time in her r life she had ever been coffron confronted with a tact fact she wanted desperately desperate to be blind to it was also the il first time in her life shed ever been achingly agonizingly unhappy and it make any sense what she had done had been stupid and dangerous but atvas it was stupider and just as dangerous in in another way to let herself be unhappy about it to be disturbed and even alarmed was something else again but not to be unhappy unhappiness is blinding and the one thing she was surest of after the evening at sues and the last half hour in the bar with taussig was that she had to keep her wits sharp and clear and perfectly objective no matter what happened to her heart in the process in fact it was richard taussig she had to think about not miguel somehow they had got mixed up in her mind so that it was hard to keep them apart they had been separate enough on the ship there been the slightest connection between them either in her mind or in fact she was sure of that it had all happened since come ashore it might be on account of his uncle diego bongaro unless she was wrong about the letter but im not wrong about it she told herself 1 I saw it its one of the things I 1 know even it I 1 dont know what its all about actually there were only two other things she really knew when she came down to it one was that taussig had opened her bag and gone through her letters and had not told the truth about it the other was that miguel had told him she was in his room the rest of it was in that dangerous border line of intuition and suspicion that was what she had to watch still even barbara french had recognized what she called Taus sigs veiled scrutiny anne shook her head it do any good to go over every detail of a day or two days the way she was doing nights a magnifying glass anyway she thought she reached down pulled the thin blanket up from the toot foot of the bed and settled back into the pillows she going to think about it and she going to think about miguel she closed her eyes just as she did the telephone on the table beside her jangled stridently it rang again before she could pull the mosquito netting out from under the mat tress and tree free her arm hello she said im sorry it was petes voice that came from the other end 1 I was just wondering about you if you got home all right I 1 hope I 1 wake you up for a minute she think of anything to answer this like pete hed always taken it for granted sometimes a little too much for granted that shed get home all right of course she said at last dont tell me its part of your job to check up and see the tourists are all properly in bed every night what are you doing up at this hour yourself captain wilcox ive just been to a meeting of the falange my child pete said cheerfully its called something else now but its the same old leopard with the same did spots go back to bed im putting you vou on the clipper tomorrow remember you mean youre taking me out to dinner tomorrow night ill see you about six good night dear anne put down the phone and wriggled back under the net she azz P fp f P I 1 h W 0 II 11 you went through my bags yesterday you mr taussig sat up crossed her legs under her and sat staring through her filmy gauze box at a lighted ship moving across the window in the silver ocean beyond the reef the falange Of course I 1 never thought of that A whole new pattern wove itself quietly in front of her for the moment she forgot miguel and richard taussig and herself here was her story it was what shed come down to get in the curious way that better newspaper people than shed ever be stumbled into things she had stumbled right into what she was hunting for entirely without knowing it diego bongaro was spanish don alvaro was spanish in everything but the place of his birth the falange was the conservative organization that had bound the old spain and colonial spaniards together especially during the civil war that had changed the mother country from a republic to a totalitarian power it was through the falange that the axis dominated spain and it was the most important sometimes actual sometimes only potential fifth column in latin and south america she tried to remember all the things shed read about it it was made up of the wealthier conservative serva tive which down here would usually mean anti democratic groups it was supposed to be the stronghold of the idea of spanish empire at one time when there was still peace in the world it meant much more than the various foreign associations in the states had meant or people had thought it including most mist of its members probably in times like the present it meant something very different fere nit that was why in puerto rico it had been disbanded or officially it had been apparently there were still remnants of it in other places in central america it still flourished correspondents were always writing about it trying to make people at home aware that there were powerful anti american forces at work close to the rio grande anne lay down again and closed her eyes don alvaro was old spain diego Gon garos wife who was gra bielas mother had been killed in the spanish civil war miguels orders had leen b een cancelled by the war department maybe it all added up to what she say iba maybe yb e what it added up to was richard taussig except miguel not miguel it was all back again from where it had started richard taussig gripped the open window ledge of the crowded station wagon with one hand and hung on to his guide book and his yachting cap with the other he was in one of those new vehicles known locally as public cars that provide a vast network of cheap transportation for the island and make taxi drivers and chauffeurs a political bloc that no party dares to ignore at the moment the car was careening maniacally nia cally across the narrow perilous causeway out the bayamon bahamon road from san juan on the right the garbage dump smoked with evil smelling pervasiveness beyond it in the shallow head of the bay two dredges pumped softly and monotonously onous ly filling the murky oozing swamp that stretched on the left of the road making firm new land for the U S navy it was dotted with a couple of thousand oranges just then where a truck had gone off the road and just juit behind it a station wagon like mr Taus sigs had gone like a dive bomber motor deep in in the mud its rear wheels still going around A constant stream of khaki colored army trucks and open field cars trundled noisily past it and private cars darting in and out trying to pass what seemed to mr taussig to be an already solid line into town an accident would be easy enough he thought up in the hills where there was no soft cushion of mud and slime he frowned there were certain complications he expected and did not mind he was used to accidents when necessary though he preferred to avoid them he was even used to the emotional equation that women sometimes brought in but not on the level that the girl in across the hall had presented he was more used to the kind of thing he was headed for now the public car stopped on the side of the crowded road under an almond tree 11 caparra senor the driver pointed to a low group of buildings just beyond a rickety fence they looked more like subterranean mushroom sheds than the ruins of the villa of ponce de leon the first governor built his first capitol here four centuries ago a 9 0 before he abandoned III i and puerto rico to go on his search searce for the fountain of youth and found instead florida and death mr richard taussig was only superficially interested in the blue and yellow tiles and in the story of the indian cacique and the great con quis tadore who is still heard and even seen clanking up the gho ghostly aly stairs in his battle armor he tipped the caretaker enough to make inake him remember him but not enough to make him suspicious and made his way along the shaded road under the indian almonds and flambo to a roadhouse there he drank a bottle of cool pale ale in the garden and read his guide book that was toi for the record too in case one was being kept so far as he knew no one had followed him but deviousness and plausibility were a habit as much as a plan and in the half world that mr taussig operated in overconfidence was more dangerous than wasted time 1 I can get to rio piedras to the university out this way he tipped the waiter and pointed to the left fork of the ahe road he had come on and to the tuberculosis sanatorium on the way the man nodded si senor gracias senor it if I 1 walk along a public car will stop for mez me si senor mr taussig set out walking slowly the road was less crowded than the other branch nevertheless he walked past the blue stucco house set behind a great hedge of red and pink hibiscus because a cart loaded with sugar cane was passing it just then when the road was empty he turned back went quickly through the tall gate in the hedge and closed it securely behind him diego Gon garos car stood in the drive taussig glanced at his watch he had allowed himself forty five minutes to compensate tor for the temperamental pe disregard of time ilme that was another complication of the latin scene that irritated his precise mind he had not wanted to arrive at the house of diego gon garos mistress until Gon bongaro garci was there himself he was disturbed about her just as he was disturbed about graciela in fact there were too many women in all this altogether ef for his liking all except little mrs porter so far as he could see she was the one simple aspect of his problem his impulse had been to go see her that mornIn morning cr but he had rejected it it was best to let the first move come from her he went up the steps reached out to ring the bell beside the iron grilled door and stopped from inside he could hear loud and hysterical weeping it stopped abruptly and a womans comans shrill voice cried out in rapid spanish but why why diego why not let all of that alone why endanger yourself and me and your family y what is there to gain that she stopped as suddenly as she had begun A heavy chair moved there were sharp steps on the tiled floor taussig stepped back came across the porch again scraping his rubber soled shoes on the tile and bongaro came from an inner room through the portiere made of colored glass beads and short lengths of fine bamboo he smiled cordially as he opened the grill whether he was unaware that his caller had heard the end of the scene or was simply unconcerned mr taussig could not tell come in he said 1 I am happy to see that it is possible for you to be late also my friend TO BE CONTINUED |